Social Justice in Adult RE

Numerous adult RE activities provide opportunities to become better educated about and prepared to act on social justice issues.Workshops often follow a curriculum; small group discussions often follow viewing a relevant film or reading a book centered on a specific social justice issue; nationally-prominent guest speakers bring enhanced expertise to the congregation. Recent workshops and movie/book discussion groups addressed racial justice; several movie-discussion groups addressed environmental justice.

Building the World We Dream About was a curriculum-based workshop series of four sessions addressing racial justice, conducted in 2015.

Living the Pledge was a series of two half-day workshops adapted from The Richmond Pledge curriculum, conducted in 2017. More than 40 members participated in the workshops.

Out of the Living the Pledge Workshops a UUCK Race for Justice (R4J) grass-roots action team emerged that will plan and coordinate anti-racism activities, includingeducation of ourselves and others, relationship building with racially diverse populations, public demonstrations of anti-racism support by standing witness and speaking out, and advocacy for institutional change, and community action.

An educational session on Black Lives Matters in 2016 viewed and discussed BLUU.

Multiple Selma film/book small group discussions in 2015.

Film viewing and discussion groups related to environmental justice have focused on topics such as solar power, food and eating, permaculture, frogs and amphibians, water, wilderness conservation, and fracking.

Two members were invited by the West Shore UU Church in 2012 to conduct a discussion on Child Slavery and Chocolate following the showing of the documentary The Dark Side of Chocolate.

Guest speakers have addressed issues such as: The Move to Amend, the Middle East and refuges crisis, and for-profit prisons.